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Format of Tek WFM files?

Posted: Wed Mar 23, 2005 10:15 pm
by Richard Henderson
I noticed there is a plug-in to read Tek WFM files. I have a Tek THS720A portable oscilloscope and want to record waveforms from the oscilloscope and import into dPlot. Can you provide me with the file format specification for the Tek WFM that the existing plug-in reads? If the Tek WFM has a header file that maintains information about the waveform, then I want to use this format for waveform storage. Thanks.

Posted: Wed Mar 23, 2005 10:37 pm
by DPlotAdmin
Richard,
I've sent you via e-mail the C source file for the Tektronix plugin and a Tektronix PDF file describing the file format (which doesn't seem to be 100% accurate, but was a good starting point). Let me know if you have any questions.

Posted: Wed Apr 05, 2006 2:31 am
by scoepshop
@dplotadmin

can you send me the plugin for tektronix wfm files?
can i use this plugin with the test version ?

i want test it with the new tektronix oscilloscopes series dpo7000, this oscilloscope saves wfm files up to 400 mb and i need a program that can work with files up to 150-200 mb

Posted: Wed Apr 05, 2006 7:14 am
by DPlotAdmin
You can get the plugin for Tektronix files here: http://www.dplot.com/plugins/fileimport/tek.dll

Create a folder \plugins\fileimport below dplot.exe and copy tek.dll there.

Please let me know how this works out for you.

Posted: Wed Apr 05, 2006 8:35 am
by scoepshop
thx for the quick answer

i have test the plugin with several wfm version.

i have no problem work with older wfm data, but when i use the wfm files from new oscilloscopes i get a errormessage and the programm shuts down

working wfm from Tektronix TDS5000B-Serie:

http://www.scopeshop.de/File_1455/TDS5000B.wfm

don“t working wfm from Tektronix DPO7000-Serie:
http://www.scopeshop.de/File_1454/DPO7000_10K.wfm

can you fix this ?

Posted: Wed Apr 05, 2006 8:44 am
by DPlotAdmin
can you fix this ?
Maybe. The problem is there's more than a little guesswork involved in deciphering most of the commercial digitizer formats, Tek included. Your files will help, though. Thanks for those.

Posted: Wed Apr 05, 2006 2:27 pm
by DPlotAdmin
I'll have to set this aside for now. I've looked around the Tektronix web site but not had any luck. Their ConvertTekWfm utility also fouls up with your file. I had high hopes for their DPO7kVisa application, but it polls the oscilloscope directly and doesn't have anything to do with WFM files.

If you find any information on the file format, of course let me know and I'll be happy to add support. For what it's worth, I've asked Tektronix in the past for file format information, but received a standard "it's proprietary, use our tools" response.

Posted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 4:35 am
by scoepshop
now i have the new file format !

http://www.scopeshop.de/File_1499/001137802.pdf

in this document you find all you need !

i hope you can fix the probleme with the waveforms posted above

Posted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 9:19 am
by DPlotAdmin
Excellent, thanks much for that document.

Try this: http://www.dplot.com/plugins/fileimport/tek.dll. (As before, place this DLL in the \plugins\fileimport folder below dplot.exe, overwriting the existing version)

Follow-on-question

Posted: Thu Apr 27, 2006 10:14 am
by Scope_User
Is it then possible to export (as a csv file) from DPlot a csv file that contains only a section of the waveform that has been recorded?

Posted: Thu Apr 27, 2006 10:25 am
by DPlotAdmin
The only way to do that is to first get rid of the data you don't want to save. See Edit>Truncate X.